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Rush Limbaugh’s take on Osawatomie

The president of the United States, not Fidel Castro, not Kim Jong-il, not Mao Tse-tung, not Lenin, not Stalin, not Gorbachev, not Saddam Hussein, not Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, not Hugo Chavez, but the president of the United States said that while a limited government that preserves free markets speaks to our rugged individualism as Americans, such a system doesn’t work and has never worked. The president of the United States said that the United States of America, as founded, “has never worked.” Stop and think of that. Ponder that for a moment. The president. Not the head of the SEIU. Not the chairman of some congressional committee. Not a Democrat presidential hopeful. The elected president of the United States said in Osawatomie, Kansas, trying to be Teddy Roosevelt, that the United States of America has never worked. That is a quote, “has never worked.”…..

It is, my friend, and don’t doubt me, the same speech that Stalin always gave, that Mao Tse-tung always gave, that Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez and Kim Jong-il still give. Communist leaders around the world give this speech constantly. We’ve heard it all before, because class warfare is the fundamental principle of Marxism. Class warfare is how Marx explained economics and explained history. In fact, class warfare is how Marx explained everything. Now, oddly enough it’s how Obama explains everything now. He blames all of the current problems on the rich. And to think some people still say Obama’s not a Marxist. They won’t even call him a socialist. It’s willful blindness on the part of people who, I don’t know what kind of state of denial you have to be in to have heard this speech yesterday or to have read this speech and to have not heard a call to arms.

Just as a reminder, this is part of what Obama said:

“Roosevelt also knew that the free market has never been a free license to take whatever you can from whomever you can. He understood the free market only works when there are rules of the road that ensure competition is fair and open and honest. And so he busted up monopolies, forcing those companies to compete for consumers with better services and better prices. And today, they still must. He fought to make sure businesses couldn’t profit by exploiting children or selling food or medicine that wasn’t safe. And today, they still can’t.

And in 1910, Teddy Roosevelt came here to Osawatomie and he laid out his vision for what he called a New Nationalism. “Our country,” he said, “…means nothing unless it means the triumph of a real democracy…of an economic system under which each man shall be guaranteed the opportunity to show the best that there is in him.”

Now, for this, Roosevelt was called a radical. He was called a socialist — even a communist. But today, we are a richer nation and a stronger democracy because of what he fought for in his last campaign: an eight-hour work day and a minimum wage for women — insurance for the unemployed and for the elderly, and those with disabilities; political reform and a progressive income tax.

Who is it that hates America again? I feel like I should be thanking Gingrich and Limbaugh and Malkin and Geller–they’re making as good a case for The New Hate as I could ever wish for.

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